Parliament

Mr WALSH (Murray Plains) —1 rise to lead the debate for the coalition on the Regional DevelopmentVictoria Amendment (Jobs and Infrastructure) Bill 2015. When you think about regional development, often youthink about decentralisation, one of the words that used to be used in this area. It has been talked about for decadesin Victoria. You can go back to the time just after World War I and the soldier settlement scheme, where greattracts of land were carved up for returned soldiers. Farming was one of the first decentralisation or regionaldevelopment programs put in place in Victoria. There have been some very good successes with that and somenot-so-good outcomes with those programs. If you look at the communities of Mildura, Robinvale, Shepparton andTatura, you realise that those former soldier settlement blocks arc now vibrant communities producing a lot ofwealth and employment for Victoria.

Over the decades both sides of politics when in government have talked about regional development and thevarious ways in which government can encourage it across Victoria. The debate has always been around how youbest get value for taxpayers dollars with the programs a government runs. From the point of view of the coalition,when in government, it determined that it was important to get leverage from government investments. It was abouttaxpayers dollars generating additional investment, whether it be from the community or private enterprise, andmost importantly that creates jobs as well.

In my time in public life and in business in Victoria, I believe that the Regional Growth Fund that the coalitiongovernment established in its term was the best model for a regional development program. It assisted countrycommunities in their public infrastructure tlu-ough the Local Government Infrastnicture Fund, and it helpedbusinesses to create employment. The former government also provided funding through the Putting Locals FirstFund, the Local Government Infrastructure Fund, the developing stronger regions program and the resilientcommunity program. The former government made 1426 targeted finding decisions over the last four years, whichwas a total investment of nearly $500 million into 1800 projects, and that leveraged another $2 billion worth ofinvestment.

If you think about the return on investment there, for every dollar invested by the government another $3 ofinvestment was secured. That is a very good rate of return. The coalition created something like 23 000 jobs acrossregional and country Victoria, 6000 of those being direct full-time jobs, nearly 12 000 being indirect jobs and about5000 being construction jobs, which particularly helped funding.

I am sure that during this debate members on this side of the house will mention what happened in their electorates,because they are very proud of this fund. If you think about it, you realise that regional development should be forall communities across Victoria, not just the major regional cities, whether it be Berriwillock in the electorate of themember for Mildura, or Bendigo or Ballarat, they all deserve assistance with any regional development packagethat might be provided.

The keys to the former government's Regional Growth Fund and particularly the Local Government InfrastructureFund, was that money was given to local governments so they were able to make the decisions about how it wasspent. They did not have to go back to a higher authority somewhere in Melbourne to apply that funding. Inaddition, councils could use that money as their contribution to get additional grants. One of the things the formergovernment looked at in developing this policy was that our smaller country communities quite often do not haveenough money to make the local contribution for particular grants. The Local Government Infrastructure Fundprovided an opportunity for local governments to bulk up their contribution to apply for a larger grant and a betterprogram.

I place on the record the support provided to the then Deputy Premier's office by Clay Manners over the time itdeveloped and implemented the Regional Growth Fund. Clay was a policy director at the Victorian FarmersFederation for a number of years. Being a Victorian I might be biased, but I think he has probably been one of thetwo pre-eminent agricultural policy people in Australia over last two or three decades. He has a good understandingof what is needed by industry and communities and of how you can get leveraged investment out of these fundingprograms. He helped with the design of this program, and he worked in the former Deputy Premier's office makingsure that it was implemented with the intent we believed it should have. He made sure we got those good outcomesfor our regional communities.

It may be a poisoned chalice, because sometimes incoming governments do not like to keep on the departmentalstaff of outgoing governments, but I would like to put on the record that the staff of Regional Development Victoria(RDV), whether it be the staff in Melbourne or those out in the regions, went that extra mile in the development andimplementation of the Regional Growth Fund, working with communities and businesses to ensure that theirapplications and submissions met the criteria and delivered a good outcome not only for the taxpayer but also forparticular businesses over that time.

If you go to some of the subsets of the program we had in government, there was the Energy for Regions program.Gas is an energy source that is more cost effective than electricity for large businesses that have to do a lot ofheating, whether they are running boilers or running milk evaporators, or whether they are hospitals, which alsoconsume a lot of energy. The previous Labor government said it could not provide any more gas. It said it hadprovided gas to all the communities in country Victoria it was possible to provide it to. Labor had actually given upon trying to extend the reach of that provision into the future. With a lot of work by departmental staff and a bit ofimagination from a number of people, the coalition government's gas program has delivered some great outcomes.

Between 2012 and 2014, works started on connecting Avoca, Huntly, Whittlesea, Bannockburn, Warburton,Wandong-Heathcote Junction and Koo Wee Rup to the natural gas network, and that is delivering a good outcomefor those communities. The other part of the program, which is where the innovation comes into it, is that theformer government put some of the Regional Growth Fund money together with some money from theMurray-Darling Basin plan — a bucket of money from Simon Crean, formerly a Minister for Regional Australia,Regional Development and Local Government — to bulk it up to $85 million to go out to market and look atinnovative ways of delivering gas to those communities.

Last September a contract was signed with Brookfield to supply gas to Lakes Entrance, Orbost, lnvermay,Heathcote, Marong, Terang and Maldon. With that extra money from the commonwealth out of theMurray-Darling Basin plan, Swan Hill, Kerang, Robinvale and Nathalia will also receive compressed gas, and thatwill give them gas at an equivalent price to the towns that are hooked up to the grid. That will be reticulatedthrough those towns, but there will be a mother tank at the edge of town that will be tilled up, and a truck will bebrought in at intervals when a refill is needed. That will enable those towns to have reticulated gas in the way theywould if someone built a pipeline over 200 or 300 kilometres, which would be necessary to get out to thoseparticular towns.

There has been some very good innovation in this area. It was something the previous Labor government saidcould not be done, and it is something the current Minister for Regional Development has talked about scrapping.On coming to government, Labor was going to tear up the contract on this project, but to the credit of the WeeklyTimes, Chris McLennan at that newspaper blew the whistle on the government, alerting us to the fact that thatcontract was going to be torn up. He wrote a major article saying that was going to happen, and that forced thegovernment into backing down and saying it was going to proceed with this project.

That is the Energy for the Regions part of it. Earlier I briefly mentioned the Local Government Infrastructure Fundpart of it. That enabled people to fix up their kitchens in country halls, and build new playgrounds and facilities. AsI said, they quite often built that money up into larger grants. I will refer to some of the really great outcomes thatparticular program delivered across country Victoria. I again mention the town of Berriwillock in the electorate ofthe member for Mildura. In that community local government infrastructure money from Buloke Shire Council,money from the Country Fire Authority, which is building a new fire shed in Berriwillock, and money out of thePutting Locals First Fund bulked up the funds from the program to build a new fire shed with a large meetingroom, kitchen and fantastic community facilities that never would have been built if any one of those programswere done in isolation. It replaced four existing buildings in town, including the hall, with this lovely new buildingthat is multipurpose and multiuse, will be used into the future and has really put the heart back into the communityof Berriwillock.

There is a similar example in the electorate of the member for Gippsland South with the Yarram district hub.Money was put together to create a facility where there is child care, preschool, and maternal and child health allcoming together in one hub. Again, without initial fimding from the Local Government Infrastructure Fund andPutting Locals First Fund to max it up, that sort of outcome would not have been able to happen. 1 know theprevious member for Gippsland South, Peter Ryan, is very proud of that project. It is something he fought for overa number of years during his parliamentary career.

The last example, which is another very good one, is in the electorate of Ripon in the town of Donald. Again,money out of all those finds and federal money was put together to have a new childcare centre replace thekindergarten that was falling down and had possums in the roof all the time. This is now a fantastic facility in thecommunity of Donald because of this program and the way it could be leveraged.

On Sunday I had the opportunity to spend a number of hours at the convention centre at the Regional VictoriaLiving Expo. It is the fourth year that program has been run, and it is a great opportunity particularly for localgovernment and the economic development units of local government to have a stand at the expo, which is paid forby Regional Development Victoria, to showcase the wares of all the different communities across country Victoriain order to attract people from Melbourne, particularly professional people with skills, to come, live and work inthose communities. Last year about 10 000 people went through the Regional Victoria Living Expo. I do not knowthe final numbers for this year, but I know that by Saturday night they were up to over 5000. On the Sunday a lot ofpeople went through there, and there was a lot of positive feedback from those who had stands and were gettingreally serious interest from people who want to relocate to country Victoria. That is a great outcome. Thedisappointing part is that, as I understand it, the new Labor government has made no commitment as to whetherthat expo will continue. The feedback I get is that it most likely will not be continuing into the future, which wouldbe very disappointing.

From a business point of view, the leveraged investments I have talked about are significant. I want to highlight afew from around Victoria that have delivered great outcomes for those communities and the Victorian economy. Inno particular geographic order I will start in Mildura, where you have got the investment that was made with Olam,a large almond processing plant. The company received assistance for road, power and water infrastructure toenable a development that saw a $60 million investment in an almond processing plant.

For those in the house who do not know much about the almond industry, it is our fastest growing horticulturalexport industry in Victoria. Last year the export of almonds was worth in excess of $380 million to this state. Wewere on track to have the almond centre of excellence based in Mildura, because over 70 per cent of Australia'salmonds are produced there. The disappointing thing is that that centre should have been in Mildura, butunfortunately it was won away by South Australia because the new Labor government did not put money on thetable to have it established in Mildura.

Another important investment is in the electorate of Shepparton. Various programs out of the Regional GrowthFund enabled a package of $22 million to be put together to assist SPC to stay in Shepparton and make sure allthose jobs at SPC were kept there. As I understand it, new product lines and other innovative facilities are startingto be built now. I look forward to SPC getting those new products to market.

The other business in Shepparton, which is an exciting one that benefited from the Regional Growth Fund, is thePactum Dairy Group plant. A new dairy plant has been built there principally to process and package ultra heattreated (UHT) milk. It was interesting to be on a trade mission to China last year with Bega Cheese in Chongqing.Bega Cheese is utilising the spare capacity of that Pactum plant to pack UHT milk, which is now being sold inChongqing in a deal with a Chongqing trading company. It is going straight into their supermarkets in Bega'sbrand. The important thing with overseas trade is making sure we have our brands in their markets so that we cancapture value and continue to own that value into the future rather than supplying product into their particularbrands. The Pactum plant received money from the Regional Growth Fund to assist with that, and from memory itwas about a $35 million investment by the Pactum Dairy Group.

In the electorate of Lowan, for members who love Peking duck, I indicate that the majority of Peking duck that isconsumed in Victoria and even Australia comes from Nhill. An upgrade there was enabled by money from theRegional Growth Fund. From memory they are processing about 90 000 ducks a week now. It is a great facility.The other part of that facility and a story that a lot of people do riot know — is that a large community of Karenpeople has moved in and adopted Nhill and is making a great contribution to the Nhill community.

In the electorate of Ripon, True Foods is a food business that relocated from Melbourne to Maryborough. Itemploys a significant number of people there now. In excess of 100 jobs have been created in Maryboroughbecause True Foods moved up there. It is very happy with its move. It has a stable and reliable workforce and hasachieved a great outcome for Maryborough and True Foods.

Turning to the electorates around Bendigo, there is money that assisted Hazeldene's Chicken Farm with itsupgrade. We know the chicken industry is under a fair bit of pressure in Victoria as to where it can get to buildchicken sheds. There arc opportunities in some of the larger broadacre areas north and west of Bendigo wherechicken sheds can be built, but you need a processing plant probably within I V2 or 2 hours of those sheds. It was amajor expansion of Hazeldene's Chicken Farm that was enabled through assistance from the Regional GrowthFund.

The South-West Coast electorate saw investment go into the Midfield Meat Group. I notice that yesterday theMinister for Planning made a decision in relation to a particular application down there, which will lead to a goodoutcome for everyone. But when the grant to get the Midfield Meat Group upgrade going was given, there was afair bit of controversy about that. I am glad to see that the new government has actually taken ownership of what isa fantastic outcome there. There is a new dairy processing plant to provide milk to the Chinese market into thefuture.

If you think about Geelong and Cotton On, you realise that it is an Australian company with a great success story.Five hundred jobs were created at Cotton On in Geelong with assistance from the Regional Growth Fund. If youtravel round towns now, you see a lot of retail outlets for Cotton On. It is a real success story — an Australiancompany that had some assistance from the Regional Growth Fund.

I am getting near the end of the list, but there is a lot of good news. Some other examples of companies thatreceived assistance in Gippsland South are Devondale Murray Goulburn at Leongatha and Burra Foods atKorumburra, both of which are dairy processing plants. If anyone has not been to the Burra Foods plant atKorumburra, 1 suggest they go along. The expansion plans they have are to supply the Chinese market. They haveequity partners from Japan. Japanese investors have invested in that business, but it is principally aimed atsupplying the Chinese market. It is a really great business, which again had some financial assistance forinfrastructure to expand its operations.

In the electorate of the member for Gippsland Fast the example I will give is Patties Foods. It is another businessthat received assistance for infrastructure, particularly around drainage. That money allowed the business toexpand. It is one of the major employers in Bairnsdale and is a great local business. It has now gone corporate; it isnow listed on the stock exchange. it supplies quite a few of the well-known brands in the pie and cake business.The other business that got assistance in that area was Vegco, which is a large vegetable and salad processing plant.

I turn now to my own electorate and the Kagome business in Echuca. It is the principal tomato processing plant inVictoria. It received several grants, particularly to enable it to put in a beetroot processing line. Because the beetrootprocessors in New South Wales were closing down, Kagome was given an opportunity to process beetroot, run theplant longer and create longer term employment for staff there. The company has also introduced carrot processing.

The message I wanted to get through is that whether it be large regional communities or smaller countrycommunities, over the last four years nearly every community has had some benefit from the Regional GrowthFund. The previous government wanted to make sure that we had the criteria and the rules set up to enable bothsmall and large communities to get a share of money to help them grow. Whether it be Berriwillock, which is asmall community, or whether it be Bendigo, Ballarat or Beaufort, each should have the opportunity to have itscommunity grow through whatever regional growth fund is put in place by whichever government is in office at thetime.

What we are debating today is the Regional Development Victoria Amendment (Jobs and Infrastructure) Bill 2015.I think the number of projects I have mentioned and the number of projects that other members on this side of thehouse will discuss in relation to their own electorates as they make contributions on this bill will demonstrate thesuccess of what has been in place. I hope with the bill that is before the house and the changes that the governmentis proposing that we can all stand here in another three or four years time and talk about how equally the program has been delivered across all of Victoria and not just into key regional communiites. The challenge for any government when it creates these sorts of programs is to make sure it delivers for everyone right across Victoria.

I notice that both in the lead up to the election and in his post election speech, the Premier made a commitment to govern for all Victoria. I hope, particularly with this regional development program, that this is the case. I hope there will be opportunities for communities in not only Labor seats but also coalition seats right across Victoria. We should make sure there is a good outcome, whether that be for community infrastructure or for business to create jobs into the future. The coalition will not be opposing this piece of legislation. However, as I said, we will watch with interest to make sure it actually delivers right across Victoria.